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“This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire a very recognizable, well-located property from another well-known ºüÀêÊÓƵ real estate family,â€� Tom Stern, executive chairman of Clayton-based Gershman Commercial Real Estate, said in a statement.

The portfolio consists of 13 multi-tenant office buildings, four retail properties and one industrial-warehouse facility with a combined 830,000 square-feet in the area around Clarkson Road and Highway 40 (Interstate 64). Some 160 tenants use the buildings.

A purchase price was not disclosed, but Gershman and BurkHill Real Estate said that, combined with planned investments in office amenities and other upgrades, the transaction is in excess of $100 million.

The Sachs family name was among the biggest in Chesterfield real estate, with some calling the late Louis S. Sachs, who died in 2011, the father of modern Chesterfield. His son, Stephen Sachs, who led the firm after his father’s death, died in late 2016.

“Ultimately that led to a decision to sell and divest the portfolio, and I’m sure it was a very difficult decision for them to make,� said Chris Fox, executive vice president and managing director of brokerage and advisory services for Gershman.

For two years, Gershman and the Sachs family discussed a transaction. Fox said the Sachs family wanted to handle the transaction in a single closing, which led to Gershman working with BurkHill real estate as an equity partner in the deal. BurkHill Real Estate Investors is a private real estate investment fund founded by industry veteran and ºüÀêÊÓƵan Mark Burkhart, the former CEO of Cassidy Turley.

“The decision to sell these assets was very difficult but this transaction was as close to a win-win for everyone as we felt we could have achieved,� the Sachs family said in a statement. “We felt Gershman was the ideal partner to best honor the legacy of Sachs Properties both for our employees and our tenants and we’re very happy they were able to partner with another local firm in BurkHill.�

Fox said Gershman plans to take on many of Sachs’ employees to continue managing the real estate portfolio. And Gershman plans major amenity upgrades to improve the properties in a market where office tenants and their employees are demanding extras like fitness centers and food options in their buildings.

For Gershman, it’s the second major transaction of 2019. Early this year, Gershman sold much of its property portfolio in downtown Clayton to developer Fred Kummer, who plans a 21-story condominium tower there. Fox said the two transactions were on a “parallel track� and weren’t strategically related.

Meanwhile, about 150 undeveloped acres the Sachs family owns in that area of Chesterfield will remain in their hands. There’s no word yet on anything planned there, but they have had success in recent years selling off portions for new development, including the Watermark apartment complex, a mixed-use project planned by Pearl Companies and the site of Pfizer’s new ºüÀêÊÓƵ office.